A common scream (and yes, there is no other word for it) among reform opponents is that they don’t want their taxes to pay for someone’s healthcare. I heard it at Castle’s town hall last week from an older “gentleman” holding up a sign saying “Obamacare is Eldercide” (which is ironic in and of itself, since if he doesn’t want to pay for someone else’s healthcare, then why should he care one way or the other about who dies or lives under any plan, since he seems to only care about himself). Indeed, the implication in not wanting your taxes to go to pay for something is that you disagree with what your taxes are paying for.
Alright. Touche. Two can play this game.
I don’t want my taxes paying for social security checks going to guys like him. Why should I my money support his welfare when he cares not for mine?
I don’t want my taxes paying for his medicare.
I don’t want my taxes paying for the upkeep and maintenance of the roads leading to his house. Fuck him. He can fix the potholes himself.
I don’t want my taxes educating his children and grandchildren. If he is so smart, he can pay for private education or teach them himself.
I don’t want my taxes to pay for the firetruck he may need when his house is burning down. Fuck him. He’s got a water hose, let him do it himself.
For that matter, he better never call the cops or 911. My taxes pay for that and I don’t want to save his miserable ass from whatever trouble he is in. And he better never use the court system, or the Post Office. My taxes pay for those things too. And only people who I agree with can use the services provided for by my hard earned dollars.
That is what this is about.
Yes, there are some libertarians and conservatives that just do not agree with the government imposing taxes to pay for social services. They have their own utopian view of a Darwinian society where everyone is out for themselves, and what they earn and make stays with them. Where the government should only exist to provide for the national defense and to enforce the Bill of Rights. I respect that view. In some ways I share it, for I want the government to provide for the national defense and to protect our rights. But I want the government to do more to promote the general welfare of its people. Like providing a social safety net in the forms of social security, unemployment insurance, and healthcare. But I digress.
Often times opposition to what the government proposes to do with the tax revenues it collects is rooted in an unprincipled opposition. They are perfectly fine accepting the government services they like, but don’t want to provide the same opportunity to others. They don’t want to pay for the unemployment insurance for the incompetent lazy other people who lose their jobs, but it better be there for them. They want their medicare, but no healthcare for you!
There is no other word for it but selfish. They don’t care for the common good, just their good. They don’t realize we live in a society in which they are one in 300 million.
And if I could have my druthers, I wouldn’t want my money going to selfish fucks. But I have the intelligence and the compassion to realize that we are all in this together.